The first 17 European Universities have been announced

Today a big step towards building a common European Education Area has been made. 17 European Universities involving 114 higher education institutions from the EU have been selected to facilitate cooperation of researchers, staff and students by creating inter-universities campuses. The overall goal of the initiative is to develop a common long-term strategy based on excellence and sustainability, where students and researchers can benefit from mobility and exchange of knowledge. The award criteria include amon other societal dimension of the universities and contribution to regional development, for example through the implementation of Smart Specialisation Strategies. The alliances will start operating in September and the second Erasmus+ call will be announced in October 2019. The first call aims at boosting higher education by pooling the expertise and resources from the partner institutions. While some alliances cover wide range of disciplines, others are focusing on smart specialisation, societal role of universities or urban coastal sustainability. Each of them is involving approximately seven higher education institutions from all around Europe, leading to new partnerships. The 17 alliances include a broad range of partners: universities of applied sciences, technical universities, universities of fine arts, but also  research-intensive universities. The Commission plans to scale up the initiative in the next Erasmus programme for 2021-2027. We are happy to see that many of the selected institutions are based in our member regions - congratulations and we wish you a fruitful collaboration! We will be tackling the topic of European Universities in our upcoming activities.   Read more in the Factsheet on the European Universities.